(Exodus) Exodus 7:1

Now, in chapter 7, verse 1, notice what God says to Moses. He's having a little trouble with Moses, by the way. And the Lord said unto Moses, See, I have made thee a god to Pharaoh, and Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet.

That is, he'll speak for you. Remember, he'd complained about the fact that he was not eloquent, and now Aaron is to be his prophet. Now, this, by the way, is the finest definition, I think, you'll find of a prophet.

It's given here in an illustration, you see. Moses will be a god to Pharaoh, and Aaron will speak for him, and Aaron will be a prophet. Now, God has sent prophets to speak to His people in the past.

These prophets, you see, are those who speak for God. A prophet is one who has a message from God to the people, and he's the very opposite of a priest. A prophet comes out from God and goes to the people.

The priest represents the people, and he comes from the people, and he goes to God, representing them. Therefore, a priest is not to speak for God, and a prophet is not to represent the people. He's to represent God.

And Aaron now is to represent Moses before the people, and Moses is representing God before both the people and Pharaoh. That, I think, is something that is here that God would have us know. Now, will you notice the battle has not been joined between the gods of Egypt and the Lord God of Israel, but we're coming to it now.

You see, everything had been preparation. God was preparing the children of Israel. He was preparing Moses and Aaron, and He has been preparing, actually, old Pharaoh for the engagement now that's going to take place.

And this man, Moses, is to go in and join the battle. He'll throw the gauntlet down. Here, only the thing he'll throw down will be the rod that's in his hand.

Now, will you notice, Aaron will do the speaking, but Moses is to be there to tell him what to say. Now, that has always raised the question of whether Moses was tongue-tied or whether he stuttered or whether he had some impediment of speech. I personally do not think so.

My feeling is that Moses' impediment was actually psychological, was actually a fear that he had in his own heart, and he needed bolstering up. Forty years in the wilderness, you see, had brought him to the place that he was not adequate to deliver the children of Israel. And God wanted to make it very clear that it was God delivering them and not Moses.

And that's one of the reasons that it's so difficult for God to move today, even in the church or in the lives and hearts of many of us, because in the church today, the church is taking credit or some organization, and then there's some individual Christian that's taking credit. And when we are always getting in the way to take the credit, then the hand of God, the mighty beared arm of God's not revealed. The human element has to be put out of the way, has to be put to the side.

God cannot use the flesh. Paul said, I know that within me, that is, within my flesh dwelleth no good thing. Now, friends, if you don't believe that, then you believe God.

He said that. And it's mighty hard for some of us to think that there's not a little good in us because we've been counting on it, we've been relying on it in time of an emergency. But God doesn't want it.

God won't use it. God cannot use it. God has set the flesh aside.

And so now Aaron will speak for Moses.